The road to the unveiling of the next Nexus-branded device has been a long and confusing one. The volume of speculation about manufacturer, carrier, and hardware reached such a fever pitch at one point my RSS feed was bursting with the word “Nexus”. It’s been called so many different things that if anyone cares to look back at the history on this device from the future, it would take a team of researchers to sort out the whole mess. Then, finally, as though a great weight had been lifted from the tech world: the Samsung Galaxy Nexus took center stage in Hong Kong. It seemed like the noise would die down, soon to be replaced by the joyous celebration as the devices were delivered to Android fans across the world.

Instead, we’ve seen a trickling of users in the UK and a few US users who have purchased the international GSM version of the Samsung Galaxy Nexus. When Google and Samsung took stage together, we were told to expect the phones to be released in November. So, where is the Verizon Wireless version of this phone, powered by the year-old 4G LTE? Verizon was the only US carrier to announce that they will be carrying the phone in stores, but the phone is nowhere to be seen. An equally odd event was the recent announcement that Google Wallet, the NFC payment system to be included on the Galaxy Nexus, might not be on the Verizon version. What exactly is going on here, and where is this phone?

Less stable than we’d like

On October 18th, Google and Samsung took stage to unveil the Galaxy Nexus, where they said the devices would be out sometime in November. It stands to reason that the carriers who will be announcing the devices on their networks will have already seen devices for network testing and quality control. Every phone endures a series of tests before the carrier announces them to assure they will be ready to go. On October 21, Verizon Wireless announced the Galaxy Nexus, complete with LTE. Since that point, however, there’s been radio silence. My recent attempt to probe Samsung and Google for details resulted in nothing. Verizon, however, left me with this:

Verizon Wireless will sell the device this year. The device is currently going through the rigorous network testing we put every new device through prior to launch.

This statement comes on the heels of four Verizon Galaxy Nexus devices showing up at the Samsung Experience earlier this week. These devices were powered by 4G LTE MiFi devices because the firmware wasn’t ready for that phone. Well, firmware isn’t made by Verizon, it’s made by Samsung usually. In this case, however, it’s made by Google. The developers on the Android team are some of the best in the world, though, so either a problem rose up that has taken them weeks to resolve, or something else is going on.

Delaying the state of the art for the state of the market

Recently a statement was released by a Google spokesperson confirming rumors that Google Wallet will not be on the Verizon Galaxy Nexus. Verizon has been partnered with AT&T to try and launch ISIS, a mobile payment service that would rival services like Google Wallet. The suspicion was that Verizon had decided to not allow a competing product on a device on their network. Dumping a collective $100 million into ISIS is bound to cause some issues, especially since Verizon’s service isn’t nearly as ready as Wallet.

Verizon responded to the Google spokesperson with a release of their own, to better explain the situation. According to Jeffrey Nelson, Verizon does not block applications. Apparently, they consider Wallet to be much more significant than an app, because it needs to be integrated into the NFC chip on the Galaxy Nexus.

Hair splitting aside, it seems like Verizon and Google are at odds about what is going on with the NFC capabilities on the device, and whether or not ISIS can be seen as an actual competing service. Those “commercial discussion”, as Jeffrey Nelson put it, are a critical component on the Galaxy Nexus. When its all said and done, it looks like the device is not ready to be released over commercial discussions. Google has been a strong proponent of NFC for quite awhile now, trying to bring a payment method that has eluded the US despite being readily available in many other places in the world. Now that they have a product that users here in the states are likely to use, the developers of products that are trying to compete are leveraging whatever they can to slow the advancement of another product.

Final Thoughts

Truth be told, most people don’t care why the Galaxy Nexus was delayed. Most aren’t concerned with who to point the finger at. The phrase “shut up and take my money” comes to mind quite often as I attempt to find out what is causing the delay on this phone. As for right now, Verizon is sticking to their guns in stating that they will be releasing the phone before the end of the year. So, until it’s December 31, the device isn’t technically late. Unfortunately, I don’t care, and like many other people staring at their local Verizon Wireless store shelves, I just want my phone.